


The Absolute Best

by rsadelle



Category: CW Network RPF, Supernatural RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-25
Updated: 2008-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-28 10:36:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/306983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rsadelle/pseuds/rsadelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The best thing, the absolute best, no strings attached, no mixed feelings, <em>best</em> thing to come out of Sophia's relationship with Chad is Jared.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Absolute Best

**Author's Note:**

> Sometime last week or the week before, I was curious about what was under [](http://strippedpink.livejournal.com/profile)[**strippedpink**](http://strippedpink.livejournal.com/) 's various Jared tags. One of them was [this post](http://keepaofthecheez.livejournal.com/735933.html) which contains a quote from Jared where he says, "Sophia Bush is a good friend of mine," and I thought, "I bet he's the best thing about her marriage to Chad."

The best thing, the absolute best, no strings attached, no mixed feelings, _best_ thing to come out of Sophia's relationship with Chad is Jared.

On the last night before Jensen and Jared have to go back to Vancouver, Danneel invites Sophia to join them for dinner. Chad and Kenzie have finally set an actual date, and everyone's being a little careful around her. Jared isn't careful, so Jensen and Danneel both forget to be too, and they just bullshit around the grill.

Jared pulls her up off the couch pretty early in the evening. "C'mon Soph. I'll walk you home and we can leave the lovebirds alone."

Sophia laughs. "See you later, lovebirds." She hugs Jensen and Danneel, and Jared hugs both of them too, even though he's going to see Jensen tomorrow at the airport.

"You don't really have to walk me home," she says when they get out to the driveway. "I am just next door."

"You have large lots," Jared says. "Besides, my mama taught me how to treat a lady." He loops his arm through hers and pulls her close to him while they walk. "How're you doing?"

Sophia leans against him. It's warm and comfortable. "Okay. Kind of sad. I don't want him back, but he's moving on."

Jared slides his arm down hers and takes her hand. "I know." They walk in silence for a moment. "Sandy's dating again. Some grad student in her department."

Sophia squeezes his hand.

"You should come visit us in Vancouver," Jared says when they get to Sophia's door.

"Isn't Jensen living in your guest room?"

"Only one of them." Jared puffs himself up. "Do you think a big TV star like me would have a house with only one guest room?"

She laughs, like she knows she's supposed to. "I'll think about it." She hugs him tight. "Thanks, Jared."

He just hangs on tighter. "You can always call me, you know."

She smiles and leans up to kisses his cheek. "You're a good guy, Jared."

***

Sophia does go up to visit, and Jared swings her around in the airport and insists on carrying her bags. Sadie and Harley climb all over her the moment Jared lets her in the house, and she gets down on the floor with them. Dogs are so uncomplicated. They just love you if you pet them, which she does, so they do.

"Hey, Soph." Jensen's always been a little reserved, but he's positively sedate in comparison to the dogs. He hugs her and then goes back to the kitchen while Jared takes her upstairs.

"Voilà!" Jared swings a door open with a pleased gesture. "A bona fide guest room."

Sophia looks it over. It's actually pretty nice, and Jared beams when she tells him this. He goes back downstairs to let her get settled in. She mostly just finds the best space to leave her stuff and brushes her hair, and then she goes down to join Jensen and Jared in the kitchen.

She's relieved when they suggest staying in and watching a movie after dinner. She really doesn't feel like going out after spending the whole day traveling. She goes upstairs and changes into pajamas. They're cute, but flannel and mostly chosen for warmth, and she throws a robe on over them. It's cold in Canada, okay?

Jared and Jensen let her choose the movie, and she takes _Ocean's 11_ out of its case and puts it into the DVD player. Jared pulls her against him on the couch. She's suddenly aware of him as not just a friend, but as a man. He smells really good. She pushes the awareness away and watches the movie.

Sophia doesn't remember falling asleep, but she wakes up moving but not under her own power. "Wha?"

"Go back to sleep, Soph," Jared says, and she does.

It's after nine in the morning when she wakes up again, safely tucked into the bed in the guest bedroom. She showers, dresses, and heads downstairs.

"Hey, you're up!" Jared pushes Jensen toward his room. "There's a great place we're going to take you for breakfast."

"Can I get coffee first?"

"You can have coffee there." Jared's already pulling coats off a hook. "I'm _starving_."

"Jensen got coffee."

Jensen comes back with his shoes on, finishes off the end of said coffee, and runs water into his mug in the sink.

"Jensen barely gets out of bed without coffee." Jared shoves one coat at her and another at Jensen. "Come on. Let's go."

The coat's probably Danneel's - it smells like her perfume - but she and Sophia are close enough in size for it to work.

Jared and Sophia take great pleasure in ordering the frothiest, girliest coffee drinks on the menu while Jensen drinks what must be a whole pot of black coffee.

Late in the afternoon, Jared bundles himself and Sophia up in coats, hats, and scarves, and they take the dogs for a walk.

"It's nice here," Sophia says.

"Yeah, it's a nice neighborhood." Jared pulls one of the dogs back from a neighbor's yard. He takes Sophia's hand in his.

On Sunday afternoon, Jared takes her back to the airport, and when he gets out to get her bags out of the car, he leans down and brushes a light kiss to her lips.

"Come back and visit us again," he says.

"I will." Sophia wraps her arms around Jared and hangs on for a long minute. "Or you can come to Wilmington."

Jared grins down at her. "I might do that." He kisses her cheek and she goes into the terminal and he leaves.

***

Jared comes to visit on a long weekend. He and Chad go out to do some kind of guy thing on Friday night, which, knowing Chad, could be anything from lap dances at a strip club to an open mic night at some real world version of Karen's Café, but even though he spends Friday night with Chad, it's in her house that he spends Saturday recovering.

Saturday night, they go out for dinner and stroll along the riverfront holding hands. One of the streetlights over the boardwalk is out. Jared puts his hands on Sophia's hips and pushes her back against the streetlight pole and the dark and the bulk of him hide her from the view of the world while he kisses her.

***

Chad and Kenzie get married over Memorial Day weekend, when her friends have a long weekend break from college. Sophia would prefer to sit in the back row, but Jensen and Danneel insist she come and sit in the middle with them.

She goes to the reception and blesses Kenzie's sweet little heart when she's at a table with only people she knows. She planned to stay long enough and no longer, but when all of the formal reception stuff is done, Jared comes to find her and drags her onto the dance floor.

She's careful not to dance with Chad, and not to compare it to her own wedding.

"Okay?" Jared asks. They're slow dancing. She nods and lays her head against his chest.

***

Jared comes by after the brunch for close friends the next morning. Sophia wasn't invited.

"What are you doing this summer?" he asks her.

She lets him into the house. "Nothing special. I'll probably spend some time on the beach here, some time on the beach in LA."

Jared settles himself onto a stool in her kitchen. "I'm filming in San Francisco. If it gets too hot for you in LA, come up and stay with me. I know Harley and Sadie would be glad to see you."

Sophia steps between his legs and pushes his hair out of his eyes. "And you?"

"I'd be awful glad to see you." Jared lifts her up easy, and she ends up straddling his lap and wrapping her arms around his shoulders to keep from falling off.

"Yeah?" She asks it soft.

"Yeah," he says just as soft, and their lips meet in the middle of it.

***

She makes it a three-day road trip up the 1. It's just her and the road and stops for anything that seems interesting - beaches, restaurants, and a memorable bakery with the best butter cookies she's ever had.

The dogs bark when she rings Jared's doorbell.

"Hey, Soph!"

Sophia wades her way through the mass of dog, puts her hands on Jared's face, and kisses him.

"Go," he says with a sharp hand movement, and the dogs wander off into another part of the apartment. He walks backwards so she can walk forwards and they can kiss all the way to his bedroom.

Somewhere after her skirt is off but before his pants are more than just unzipped, he curses and says, "I don't have-"

"I do." Sophia leans over the side of the bed and grabs for the purse she held onto all the way down the hall. She has a box of condoms in it, and she takes one out and gives it to Jared.

"I like a woman who comes prepared."

Sophia wriggles out of her panties while Jared gets his clothes off and the condom on. "I'm prepared to come."

Jared laughs delightedly, and she laughs with him, and that's what it's like when he pushes into her for the first time.

***

On weekends and days when Jared doesn't have to be on set, they do touristy things: Coit Tower, walking the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, Chinatown, Lombard Street, cable cars, The Exploratorium. The third weekend she's there, they fly back to Wilmington and pick up her dogs.

During the week, Sophia finds ways to keep herself entertained. She gets a library card and finds a yoga class. She walks up and down the city streets. She takes an Indian cooking class and likes it so much that she takes Thai, sushi, Danish baked goods, and cake decorating.

Jared starts saying, "Honey, I'm home," when he comes through the door every night and teasing her about her housewifely ways. Sophia goes shopping and one night when he says it, she comes out of the kitchen in three-inch heels, an all-over print fifties shirtdress, and a lace-edged apron. They find out that the dining room table will take both their weights.

They both get tested, Sophia finds a doctor and gets a birth control prescription, and then they can have each other skin to skin any time they want.

***

Summer winds down faster than she'd like. Jared has three more weeks of filming and then two and then one.

Every night when she falls asleep in his bed, it feels good, right.

"Wilmington's a long way from Vancouver," she says one night.

Jared kisses the top of her head. "Jensen and Danneel made it work. We can too."

**Author's Note:**

>  **A Real Place** : The bakery Sophia visits is [Gayle's Bakery & Rosticceria](http://www.gaylesbakery.com/) in Capitola (near Santa Cruz). I don't know if their butterstars are the best butter cookies I've ever had, but I remember them being quite delicious.


End file.
